Tuesday, December 11, 2018

William Easterly as the Anti-Bill Gates

Mr. Easterly faults the development community’s tendency to favor
“benevolent autocrats” because they can stifle dissent and quickly
implement Western experts’ solutions. The United Nations—“a very
ineffective club of dictators”—is particularly bad about this. “Paul
Kagame, leader of Rwanda, was on this [U.N.] commission and said
broadband is the answer. Let’s just wire everybody,” Mr. Easterly says.
An “irreverent researcher,” Kentaro Toyama, “pointed out young men are
playing videogames and watching porn after they get connected to
broadband”—which, Mr. Easterly dryly notes, is “not exactly what we had
in mind for launching prosperity."